Worried about their young starter being fatigued, the Cleveland Indians are strongly considering giving Cliff Lee some extra rest before he makes his next start. Lee, who was 10-1 with a 3.91 ERA in his first 19 starts of the season, has had back to back horrible outings, allowing 13 earned runs over 4.2 innings (25.05 ERA).

"I think what's happening is that Cliff is going through a little tiredness and a dead arm period," pitching coach Carl Willis said. "During the All-Star break, he was the one guy on our staff who didn't get any extra rest. Most of the guys got an extra day or two, but Cliff didn't get any...his velocity was down a little, and that comes with being tired. He was trying to force the ball to a spot instead of throwing it to the spot."

Manager Eric Wedge is confident that some prescribed rest will help Lee get back on track, "Everyone wants to make a big deal out of this, but when you make 35 starts during a season, you're going to have a couple of bad ones, Cliff is going to be all right."